Around The CoRner

If ASHI Were Amazon

by Jim Funkhouser July 1, 2016

If ASHI Were Amazon
If I offer you a choice of getting a candy bar for every hour of online classes you take OR getting a candy bar at each chapter meeting you attend, with the total potential number of candy bars being equal, which would you choose?

Chances are you’d choose the online classes. This is almost certainly true for millennials who were born “hard-wired” to all things electronic. Why? Because, as Meryl Streep once quipped, “Instant gratification is not soon enough.” Why drive to the store when you can order it on Amazon? So, how can ASHI and its chapters remain relevant in an “on-demand” world? It’s not as hard as you might think.

First, we acknowledge our formation and importance in this profession. We reflect on how ASHI blazed the trail, wrote the ASHI Standard, envisioned a Society that stands for protection of the home-buying public and raised the national awareness of the vital function that we ASHI Inspectors perform. This will always be our foundation, but now we must turn and leave our 1970s model to the history books. 

Second, the chapter system has been and continues to be an amazing benefit to membership. Unfortunately, not all of us live close enough to a chapter’s meeting place to regularly participate and even more unfortunately, many who do live close enough don’t join. Rather than strike the drum again, extolling the wonderful benefits of chapter participation, we must blend the analog chapter system into an analog/digital form. At the Northern Virginia (NOVA) chapter of ASHI, we are beginning this metamorphosis by webcasting our monthly meetings and offering a special “Satellite Member” classification. Now, those who can’t or choose not to attend the meetings in person can attend from home and get continuing education units (CEUs) and other benefits of chapter membership. ASHI will be holding a “how to” class on webcasting meetings at the Leadership Training Conference (LTC) in October.

Third, Michele George at ASHI headquarters has been hard at working creating a wonderful online venue for state-approved classes that you, as members, can watch and get your CEUs. Also, there are the conceptual beginnings of virtual seminars held around the country at which local chapters and ASHI National work together to provide top-notch speakers delivered at little to no cost to regions for on-site seminars via the web. 

Fourth, the ASHI website has been completely overhauled, thanks to Mike Rostescu at ASHI HQ. ASHI offers many online services and opportunities that are just a click away, and soon there will be videos on the website that will walk you, step by step, through all of the online features that you might not know about.

Finally, ASHI belongs to you. It does not “belong” to the leadership, nor to the staff. The leadership and staff are the “building maintenance engineers”…we unclog the toilets and patch the roof, so to speak. But ASHI will (and should) never become “an Amazon,” because what’s special about ASHI are the connections, the relationships, the face-to-face, hands-on education. There’s an emptiness that can never be filled by an online-only organization, but we have to be available 24/7 to everyone who needs us. UItimately, what ASHI can be is up to you. If you need help with anything, write me (Speaker@ASHI.org). If your chapter wants to start webcasting its meetings, let me know. If you have a suggestion, tell your chapter’s Council Rep or, if you don’t belong to a chapter, I’m just an email away. The point is, we can do just about anything…but we have to hear from you. 

~ Jim 
James Funkhouser, Speaker, ASHI Council of Representatives speaker@ashi.org


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